added RAM now blue screen of death

[alucard2050]

i am running Windows ME, 900mhz athalon, 256 RAM. i just added another 256 RAM chip but i get the "Windows Protection Error". i took out the older chip and i am now useing the new chip in the new slot for it so i know its not a problem there. DOS recognizes it and its in the BIOS. both chips are the same and from the same company. what can i check for next. thanks for the help......

[kinneera]

Possibly a bad RAM socket on your motherboard...

[alucard2050]

what is a ram socket. if you meen the slot it goes in, like i said i am now useing the second slot. both slots work and both chips work. they just won't work together.

[kinneera]

Sorry, misunderstood your original post. Sounds like a nasty problem, maybe Windows is having trouble properly addressing that much memory. Did you check that your motherboard/BIOS can even support that much memory (some top out at 384).

[alucard2050]

in the BIOS it says 512. would that be correct in the BIOS?

[alucard2050]

i originally had 128 megs. when i added the first 256 to it i got the same blue screen. then someone told me you cant mismatch ram so i just removed the 128 alltogether.

[Beretta]

The most likely scenario is that you are mixing different speed ram chips. Ram access speed is measure in Nanoseconds (ns). Typically ram is either 6,7, or 8ns. I'd bet a dollar that you are mixing two different speed chips. Very few motherboards can handle this, and you'll end up with the famous BSOD (blue screen of death)

[alucard2050]

is there any way to check the speed of the chips. i ordered them from the same company and ordered the same chip as i did the first time.